High-Precision Time Synchronization Based on Timestamp Mapping in Datacenter Networks

In datacenter networks, it is necessary to determine whether the path is congested according to the one-way delay of packets. The accurate measurement of one-way delay depends on the high-precision time synchronization of the source device and destination device. We have proposed a time synchronization method based on timestamp mapping, combined with in-band network telemetry technology to obtain the packet send timestamp and receive timestamp on devices. The results show that the maximum synchronization error is 19 ns, and the standard deviation is 7.8 ns with a 100 ms time synchronization period and offset adjustment strategy. The proposed time synchronization method achieves outstanding synchronization accuracy and stability.